Sharing cinematic experiences one movie review at a time…plus, something extra here and there

dimitri leonidas

Welcome to a review of a film that I had no intentions of seeing but somehow ended up actually entertained by. This is the review of Renegades!

IMDb summary: A team of Navy SEALs discover an underwater treasure in a Bosnian lake.

If you have never heard about this movie, I’m not surprised. It comes from the Luc Besson’sEuropaCorp company that has been struggling a lot with the release of its films, both in its native Europe but especially in the US (Renegades has even been taken off the release schedule in the USA, but it did already premiere in some European countries and will expand the market throughout September). Not only has this film been made by Besson’s company but he actually produced it and penned its script, together with Richard Wenk (who wrote The Expendables 2, The Equalizer, Jack Reacher 2,and The Magnificient Seven). Besson has already lost a ton of money on Valerian and I don’t really see Renegades being super profitable either.

In general, the writing for the film wasn’t bad: it also wasn’t the most original, smart or believable but it was still somewhat entertaining. The jokes and the funny banter between the soldiers were funny, while the details of their plan to get the gold out of the lake were actually quite interesting. I also liked how the movie incorporated the idea that some people, during the times of war, would rather destroy their home than see it fall into the enemy’s hands. Lastly, Renegades also had a surprising philanthropic message, although, it was advertised as, more or less, a selfish robbery story.

Steven Quale directed Renegades and did an okay job. This might actually be his best movie to date, as his previous films include Final Destination 5 and Into the Storm. Before his solo directing projects, he was a second unit director on James Cameron’s pictures. The pacing of Renegades was fine, while the action – okay too. The underwater sequences were a bit hard to follow, though.

The 5 leads of the movie were played by mostly unknown actors. They were basically The Expendables without the years of glory, consisting of: Sullivan Stapleton (300: Rise of an Empire is probably his best known previous film),Charlie Bewley (has worked on mostly young adult TV shows and movies), Diarmaid Murtagh (TV actor), Joshua Henry (Broadway actor), and Dimitri Leonidas (a few small roles in indie films). They had good enough chemistry and were believable as crazy Americans, wrecking havoc in Europe (though the majority of them are not actually Americans).

The supporting cast of the picture had a few recognizable stars, like J.K. Simmons (La La Land, Patriot’s Day, The Accountant,Terminator Genisys), whose reaction faces were hilarious (still, I’m not sure how he wandered onto the set of this movie), and Ewen Bremmer, who played a combined version of his two previous characters from Trainspotting 2 and Wonder Woman. A Dutch actress Sylvia Hoeks was the lone female in the film and she did a good job. Still, since she played a Bosnian local, I’d have loved to see a native of the region taking on the role and being exposed to a wider audience. Hoeks’s career is also on a rise, as she is next appearing in Blade Runner 2049.

In short, Renegades is a perfectly forgettable and expendable actioner that isn’t worth the full cinema ticket price but is absolutely serviceable as a rental or a TV rerun.